Books of the Year

Irving Harlow Hart, director of the extension division of Iowa State Teachers' College, has been making statistical analyses of each year's-best-selling novels since 1895. Last week in Publishers' Weekly he made known some surprising findings:

P: Most popular novel published in the U. S. in the past 37 years is Quo Vadis, written by Polish Henryk Sienkiewicz.

P: Only last year did Pearl S. Buck's The Good Earth nose Edward Noyes Westcott's David Harum out of second place.

P: Fourth and fifth places go to Sinclair Lewis' Main Street and Arthur Stuart Menteth Hutchinson's If Winter Comes.

P: Of the ten first-ranking titles nine were "first books" as far as the general reading public was concerned.

Only Author Lewis has two year's best sellers to his credit: Main Street (1920), Elmer Gantry (1927). Last week the New York Public Library said it would need more than 40 copies of his newly published Ann Vickers (TIME, Jan. 30) if it wished to satisfy public demand. Since the Library is unable to afford the expenditure, it will not stock Ann Vickers at all until next year, then one copy.

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